


Drift

by morganoconner



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Confessions, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-28
Updated: 2013-03-28
Packaged: 2017-12-06 17:19:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/738164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morganoconner/pseuds/morganoconner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve may be on the good drugs, but he's not as unaware as his partner thinks he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drift

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "kissemdanno" comm on LJ. Many thanks to Pandelion for looking it over for me when I was freaking out about how long it's been since I last dipped my toes into this fandom. ♥

Steve is floating, only peripherally aware of the steady beeping sound beside him or the strong smell of antiseptics that permeates the air or the punch of pain in his gut every time he takes a breath. Mostly, everything feels distant and dreamlike. And while he knows – or can at least take an educated guess – where he is (hospital) and why he's there (gunshot), it's difficult to work up the proper amount of anxiety while he's got a cocktail of drugs pumping away in his system. He knows from experience that fighting the feeling is only going to make it worse, so instead he lets himself relax, drifting on the ebb and flow of the waves between reality and dreaming.

There's no way to know how much time passes between that first bit of awareness and the next, when the bed beside him dips and his hand is enveloped in familiar, callused warmth.

"You're such an idiot," he hears. Danny's voice is gravelly, the way it gets when he hasn't slept in too long or when Grace is sick. "Idiot, with a capital _I_. Yes, I know I tell you that a lot, but you better prepare yourself, pal, because you're gonna be hearing it a hell of a lot more now. Now, you have reached the pinnacle of idiocy."

Steve wants to smile at this soothing familiarity, and then he wants to clap a hand on his partner's shoulder and then pull him in for one of those rough, hard hugs they only give each other when one of them has almost died. Those hugs make everything better; they ground Steve in ways none of his SEAL experience or training ever provided. But he's still floating, and his muscles don't want to work, and the words he wants to say won't come, so instead he simply listens to the comforting sound of Danny ranting.

Comforting, because a ranting Danny is an unhurt Danny, and Steve hadn't realized how much he needed that reassurance until right now.

Danny's voice fades in and out for a while, but every time Steve comes back to himself, his partner is still there, still talking, still holding onto Steve's hand like a lifeline. At one point, Steve thinks he hears the rest of 5-0 come in too, but he floats away before any of Chin or Kono's words register.

Sometime, days or minutes or hours later, he feels Danny squeeze his hand, and he lets himself float back in to hear whatever it is Danny wants to say now.

"You gotta promise to not do this to me again, okay, seriously." Danny's voice is rougher now, ragged and dry from all the talking he's done since coming into Steve's room. "I mean it. One of these days you're gonna kill me with this shit, McGarrett, and then where will you be, huh?" There's a tightness there that Steve doesn't like, the kind that tells him Danny is barely holding back tears, and it doesn't sit well because Danny is the strongest person Steve knows, pretty much. "You got any idea what it would do to me if you got your sorry ass killed, Steven? Huh?"

Steve knows. Steve knows because he's felt the same way every time it's been Danny in this bed, Danny hooked up to the beeping monitors and fluid-filled bags.

Danny sighs, squeezing Steve's hand again hard enough for his bones to creak. "I have to tell you something," he says quietly. "You're probably not gonna like it, but tough. Suck it up, okay? You have the audacity to almost die on me, the very least you can do is hear some uncomfortable truths."

But he stays silent after that for a long time, like he's trying to work himself up to whatever it is he wants to say. Steve thinks if he wasn't so close to floating away again, the sound of his heartbeat would be giving him away, because he _wants to know_ , damn it, even in this only semi-conscious state he's in, he wants Danny to tell him. He thinks it's probably important.

He's not wrong.

When Danny finally gives another resigned sigh, Steve feels him bend closer, mattress shifting as his weight shifts, and then there are gentle fingers against his cheek and a soft kiss being pressed to his forehead. And then Danny moves lower and presses another, softer, lingering kiss to Steve's mouth.

Steve can't respond, can't drag himself the full way back to consciousness, but he wishes like hell he could.

"So that's what I wanted to tell you," Danny mumbles, pulling away slowly. "And I get that it's unfair of me to have told you now when you can't even put me in a proper chokehold for it, so I promise, I _promise_ , okay, I'll tell you again soon."

 _I'll hold you to that_ , Steve thinks, even as Danny is standing up and letting go and Steve is already floating away again. _You better believe I'll hold you to that, Danno._


End file.
